


Until Tomorrow, Until Love

by fallouise



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-02-12 22:35:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12969858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallouise/pseuds/fallouise
Summary: "You weren't listening to me at all. We're eighteen and the world ahead of us, Irlo. You can still come with me onto that plane tomorrow." The world is changing and they are too.





	1. Until Tomorrow, Until Love

Dharla felt the shame spread across her cheeks before the sting of the yard stick slapped onto her fingers. Her entire class looked on with blank stares, or avoided looking in her direction altogether. She would have too, if she were in their position. Blinking tightly, she forced herself not to cry. Dharla breathed. In. Out. Then she angled her head upwards, to the teacher whose burning gaze would sear itself into her memory, the yard stick held threateningly in her open palms. "Do you  _understand_ , Miss Bautista?" A heavy accent spoke in English.

No, Dharla thought bitterly. She doesn't understand why it was suddenly a bad thing to speak her first language. No, Dharla bit her tongue, reminding herself that she would only be shamed in front of everyone if she kept resisting.

Her mouth felt foreign as a different language washed over, "I understand...  _po._ "

The woman frowned at the last syllable a sign of respect at the end of the sentence, a silent  _native_ rebellion against everything else but seemed satisfied at that, turning on her heel and  _clickclacking_ back to the front of the class. Dharla thanked God then that she had chosen to sit in the far corner. If she were lucky, she could get by the rest of today's classes without drawing any more attention to herself. And God, did that yard stick sting. Couldn't He smite the old hag for hurting children like her? She picked at the chipped wood of her desk angrily before noticing movement to the side of her head.

Dharla could pray to God every day to smite San Jose Elementary, but  _God forbid_ anything happen to her best friend: Irlo. The girl smiled apologetically. With her pristine notes and her perfect face, Dharla didn't understand why she chose to sit in the back of the class with her. Irlo swung a hand below the row of desks, and Dharla lowered hers to meet halfway.

Irlo's fingers brushed over the raw skin where the yard stick had landed. Dharla didn't hear anything about the end of World War II, or how the newly acknowledge independence of the Philippines was affecting the government. History class could go to hell, because right then, what mattered to Dharla was Irlo looking out for her.

...

Irlo followed after Dharla as they hopped onto the back of a moving Jeepney when it happened. "I'm gonna make it to the US someday," Dharla declared, one hand reaching up to hold onto the side of the vehicle as her other arm gripped her schoolbooks. Irlo had told her friend that she should've spent her monthly allowance on a new backpack for high school, but the girl wouldn't listen. She was too stubborn and wanted to treat the both of them to the new McDonalds on the other side of town. For a full week straight. She berated Dharla but inwardly, she didn't think those pesos went to waste.

She knew that even now Dharla wouldn't listen to any opposing words to her statement, but Irlo entertained her friend anyway. " _Beh_ , think of all the people who would miss you."

Dharla stuck out her chin, and Irlo tightened her grip on the straps of her backpack. "I'm still in school now, but I know I'll get there."

An old man clicked his tongue, and both Dharla and Irlo turned. "Oi, thinking of the Americas, huh? Right now is the best time,  _mga anak_. The US is our ally. Getting there will be easy." His back slouched but his spirits were high. Irlo could see in his eyes the same kind of free will that Dharla's had.

"But shouldn't we finish school first,  _po_? Or listen to our parents?" Irlo inquired, more for herself than anyone else. The bumpy road segued into Maximo Viola Street, and just within a few turns it would pass the Immaculate Concepción Parish, then into their neighborhood. The old man nodded slowly at her question. They swayed with the crowded Jeepney.

"That's true, little one. But the world is changing, too fast for us to know it," his voice sounded tired. Dharla leaned forward. Irlo found herself leaning away. She didn't like the way his determined eyes were set. "The Filipino people have always adapted, no? And we'll keep adapting. That's just the way we are."

...

"Look" Dharla grabbed the waistline of her skirt, rolling it upwards and letting the hems of her dress stray to her thighs. "a miniskirt, Irlo! When I land in the US tomorrow, men will be dying for my hand." She looked over to her friend, who was laying on her bed, no response whatsoever. Dharla put her hands on her hips. "Irlo.  _Irlo_."

That seemed to rouse the other woman from her absentminded state. "What is it?"

She sighed dramatically, choosing to sit beside Irlo on the bed. She avoided bringing this up, but with the final moment coming so quickly, she couldn't ignore it anymore. "You weren't listening to me at all. We're eighteen and the world ahead of us, Irlo. You can still come with me onto that plane tomorrow."

Dharla could only frown as her best friend shook her head. "No, no. I've told you no matter how tempting it is... I can't leave my family. I can't." Irlo looked to the side, away from her. Dharla reached out to hold her hand. The tight grip was reciprocated immediately.

"I'm doing this for my family, too, you know. Once I make it out there, I'll send them as much money as I can. I'll earn enough so I can fly back and meet you whenever." Her words snuck a laugh out of Irlo. Dharla smiled at that. "And maybe I can tempt you with my money. A few hundred American dollars is more than enough pesos!"

"You flatter me," Irlo rolled onto her side. Dharla fell sideways onto the bed, and they faced each other. Her next few words were a whisper, "Is there no way  _you_ can back out of this?"

The world slowed down, just for them, as Dharla closed her eyes. "I've lived in this neighborhood my whole life. I know when to move on when I see it."

No more words passed between them, and Dharla felt Irlo press their foreheads together. For the Philippines, in just a few decades the world was wrought in war and in vapid change, but for the two of them, at least until tomorrow, it was just them. Just Dharla, and just Irlo.


	2. Until Yesterday, Until It's Time

A pair of combat boots kicked themselves across the dashboard, one foot over the other, and for all that her nonchalant posture seemed to imply, Darla Bautista couldn't ease the tension in her shoulders. She pursed her lips and crossed her arms. She uncrossed her arms. She briefly shook her head, a mess of black hair tangling into itself. In the confinements of the car, every movement felt that much more suffocating than the last. Darla slid a hand down to the side of her seat, mechanically pulling on the lever, breathing as she reclined backwards. It felt as if she were being lowered into her own grave.

She just needed a distraction, she thought to herself, as she trained her eyes above herself.

The car's ceiling was stained and beaten, like a favorite toy gone through the motions of childhood. The sunroof was pulled back, though it was just an excuse to cover up the fact that it could not close in the first place, and Darla would easily admit that the entire car was dingy and trampled. No sane person would buy a used car like this; she, however, only had a few hundred dollars to her name. She had to have a special kind of insanity to willingly move to America by herself.

At least the evening sky outside of the sunroof looked amazing. The purples and oranges blended together like a fruit smoothie, reminding her of the money she did not have for the food she could not eat. Really, if Darla put her current situation in perspective, it would seem picturesque, cliché almost: a silver sedan parked on the side of an empty highway, backlit by a fruit smoothie sky. Her stomach growled. She clenched her eyes shut.

Darla was stalling.

The sudden admittance surprised her, as if an electrical shock had run through her skeleton, and she opened her eyes again. In a daze Darla moved her arm, her hand slipping a phone out of her pocket. She pressed the home button once. The screen lit up on the lowest brightness setting. Dark brown eyes immediately dragged themselves to the corner: three percent. The battery was almost dead. It would've been easy, she surmised, if she let the battery drain. She'd allow herself the perfect excuse. She could toss the phone to the backseat, along with the rest of her forgotten trinkets, and press her foot on the gas pedal. By the next morning, she'd be in another town with little care for much else. And if anyone were to question, Darla could look them straight in the eye, and say, "Oh yeah, about that. You see, my phone died..." And that would be that.

But Darla stayed, and her eyes remained focused on the phone. Her heart seized, jolting emotions she'd packed away just like her backseat trinkets. Here was loneliness, acute and startlingly vulnerable; here was sadness, intimate yet despairingly distant; and here was anger, a stark refusal to process any of these feelings. The phone turned off its screen by itself, and Darla saw herself in the blackened screen. Her face had twisted. She was frowning.

Her finger smoothed over the home button, but she did not press. Her throat tightened.

Swallowing saliva was difficult suddenly. Darla imagined herself digging her fingers into expansive sand, throwing away the grains as if it would assuage her feeling of drowning. The car must have driven itself into a lake, that was it. Water rose to her shoulders, over her tightlipped

mouth, plugging her ears, and enveloping _suffocating_ her entire self. If she gasped for air, Darla would find water in its place, choking a bitter fear that she’d been fervently trying to ignore. The water blurred her vision. She didn’t register that she was crying.

And yet, the deep blue had depth to it. Darla turned her phone on once again, lighting up the car interior, oblivious to the setting sun and darkening highway just outside. Two percent.

She unlocked the phone. A row of ten digits appeared, benevolent in its black lettering. Memories pursued one after the other, like flashes of light peeking through the water’s surface. Different sunsets colored her mind: her last afternoon spent in the Philippines, a kind of tropic saturation that no corner in the U.S. could compare to; or her first month after moving to California, calling a dear friend as she overlooked a clouded sky. Those same numbers were in front of her now. Instead of feeling eager, however, she found uneasiness.

Darla lifted her boots off the dashboard, bringing her knees up below her chin. In her mind, she aligned the facts. She was not drowning, or in the Philippines, or suffocating. She was in a car, a few exits away from the next resting station. It was evening. The sun had left the horizon moments ago. Darla reached up and flipped on the overhead light, lingering on the switch before withdrawing her hand. She was thousands of miles away from home, and where that exactly was, she did not know. Darla was cramped up in her car, debating whether or not to call her best friend. These were all solid facts. Indisputable.

Her reason for feeling so hesitant was not so tangible. The phone's battery ticked to one percent.

It was now or never. Darla pondered letting her phone die, again, then she imagined actually calling her friend. Inaction versus action. The safe route versus taking a risk. Her eyes

seemed to zoom into the one number, taunting her, begging her to make a decision. She thought of hearing Irlo's voice after so long.

The phone began ringing the dial tone. Oh Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. She couldn't back out now, international phone call fees be damned. Every ring reminded her of how long they hadn't spoken. The dial ended. The soft hum of electricity could be heard. And then, a single word: "Darla?" Like the world could be that simple.

Strings of thoughts pursued her tongue. Stupid things like, " _Irlo, our world's changed so much since I've left,_ " or  _"Are you still you? Do I still sound like myself?_ " flitted across her mind, but instead Darla found herself speechless. She'd argued against herself from calling for so long that, when she finally called, she had no words. Her tongue would not work with her.

"Hm..." Irlo murmured into the phone. That was familiar. It was Irlo's little telltale sign that she was thinking. And when the woman had an idea in her head, the world was no match for her. "Hey, when should I expect my souvenir to arrive?"

Darla shut her eyes. Ah, when had she started crying? She'd gotten herself so wrapped up in a world of pushing and pulling that she had forgotten there was a realm outside of that, one where she didn't have to struggle. A corner of the world where it  _could_ be that simple, like a childhood friend greeting her as if nothing had changed. She tightened her grip on her phone.

"We'll talk again soon, okay?" Zero percent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Just trying something new.  
> Note that while these two are linked, this second one is more of a spiritual sequel! Which explains the use of a smartphone when the first chapter was set much earlier lol.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


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